Howie Roseman

EAST RUTHERFORD, N.J. - Eagles owner Jeffrey Lurie endorsed the performance of general manager Howie Roseman and confirmed that the NFL's youngest GM would remain with the organization. "I think Howie's done a great job," Lurie said Sunday after the team's season-ending 34-26 win over the New York Giants. Will Howie be back? "Is that the question?" Lurie said. Yes. "Yes. " Roseman, 39, is entering his sixth season as GM. The team has gone 42-38 (.525 winning percentage)

AS ANDY REID trudged toward his inevitable end as Eagles head coach last December, attention naturally pushed in the direction of Howie Roseman, the Eagles' cherub-faced general manager operating in only his first season without Joe Banner over his shoulder. Some, including his boss, Jeffrey Lurie, saw Roseman as a shrewd judge of talent, crediting him with the choices made in the 2012 draft, while discounting his culpability in previous drafts and transactions, including the great free-agent "Dream Team" debacle of 2011, which accelerated the Eagles' dive from playoff contender to their current status among NFL rebuilders.

Picture this: The Eagles are on the clock with the No. 4 overall pick and the first three prospects on their draft board already have been chosen. The best available player is graded appreciably lower than the first three, isn't a schematic fit, and the Arizona Cardinals are offering the No. 7 selection and a third-rounder to move up three spots. The Birds brain trust has prepared for this scenario, but someone has to make the final decision. Will it be Chip Kelly or Howie Roseman?

Fresh out of Fordham Law School a mere 10 years ago, Howie Roseman showed up at Veterans Stadium ready for the first day of his Eagles internship. He felt as high as a first-round draft choice. "I come in, I'm wearing a shirt and tie - I'm in the National Football League," Roseman said. Roseman reported to Joe Banner, the Eagles' president, who had hired him to concentrate on salary cap issues. Right away, Roseman had a question for his new boss: "Where do I sit?" Banner told Roseman the truth.

For Howie Roseman, last week's Eagles front-office shake-up cut short his childhood dream of being an NFL general manager. Regardless of his new title as the Eagles' executive vice president of football operations, Roseman will not hold the role that completed a rapid ascent in the organization. He was stripped of the player-evaluation duties he had spent much of his 15-year Eagles career trying to prove he could fulfill. On the day Andy Reid was fired, Eagles owner Jeffrey Lurie endorsed Roseman.

Howie Roseman could have puffed out his chest or pointed fingers or reveled in an afternoon of vindication. Because as Eagles general manager, Roseman will eventually receive blame and criticism again. It's an occupational hazard. Yet on a day when Roseman was billed as influential in helping the Eagles land Chip Kelly as head coach, he refused to admit he felt vindicated when offered the forum. "I don't want to make this about me," Roseman said. "I think it's about our organization, our team, and giving our fans back the team they're used to. That would be vindication to me. " Roseman had been the target of criticism during the Eagles' coaching search, especially when they appeared to be exhausting their list of candidates.

Jon Gruden and Eagles general manager Howie Roseman have both been drawing questions - in different ways, says Jason La Canfora of CBS Sports. Gruden has been contacted by four clubs about their head-coaching jobs - and has turned them all down, the "NFL Insider" reports , not naming names. Roseman, on the other hand, is being whispered about around the league as a hindrance to the Eagles landing a top-notch coach, La Canfora wrote this morning . As of 10 days ago, Gruden hadn't spoken with the Eagles, according to ESPN analyst and ex-Eagles quarterback Ron Jaworski . Since then, Gruden has been widely endorsed for the Eagles job not only by Jaworski, but former Eagles coach Dick Vermeil , NFL Network analyst Mike Mayock , former Pennsylvania Gov. Ed Rendell , and Inquirer columnist Phil Sheridan . And Gruden would be interested in the right job. "He would have loved a shot at the Carolina job, the chance to work with [quarterback]

Remember the names Mike McCoy, Jay Gruden, and Ben McAdoo. All three assistant coaches are considered candidates for head coaching jobs this offseason, but more important, and in relation to the Eagles, all three are represented by agent Bob LaMonte. When Eagles general manager Howie Roseman hired LaMonte as his agent during the 2011 offseason it is unlikely he imagined it would come in handy two years later as he prepares to help owner Jeffrey Lurie find Andy Reid's replacement.

When Howie Roseman took over the business side of the Eagles' football operations this past offseason, he became one of 10 NFL general managers to handle both player evaluations and contract negotiations. The number is down to nine after Panthers GM Marty Hurney was fired in October. The remaining eight reflect a wide array of decision-makers. There are former players such as John Elway (Broncos) and Reggie McKenzie (Raiders). There are longtime scouts who worked their way up the chain of command such as Rod Graves (Cardinals)

A year ago, some Eagles were unsure who made contract decisions for the team. In December, amid a three-game losing streak, three players sat at their lockers and argued whether it was Chip Kelly or Howie Roseman who had ultimate say over the business side of football operations. Player 1 insisted that Roseman, then the Eagles general manager, controlled the salary cap and contract negotiations. Player 2 agreed but jokingly said a coach who monitors their every move with tracking devices would eventually want complete authority.

IT DIDN'T sound as if Jason Peters was going to be contributing any of the $8 million or so he is scheduled to earn this year to a Kickstarter campaign aimed at getting Evan Mathis back in the fold. "Not really," Peters said, when asked if it mattered to him whether Mathis lines up next to him at left guard this season. Peters, the Eagles' seven-time Pro Bowl left tackle, noted he has played alongside quite a few left guards over the years. "It's Al, right now," Peters said, indicating Allen Barbre, who has subbed for Mathis while the two-time Pro Bowler sits out OTAs, Mathis unhappy with his contract.

THE BIG, HAPPY personnel family Chip Kelly described for us during the NFL draft is now a little smaller. After the draft was over, the Eagles on Sunday dismissed director of college scouting Anthony Patch, director of pro personnel Rick Mueller and Southwest area scout Brad Obee, sources close to the situation confirmed to the Daily News. Patch and Mueller, especially, were tied to the regime of former general manager Howie Roseman, whose personnel say ended in January. They were Roseman's top personnel advisers, along with Ed Marynowitz, who now runs personnel and will hire his own team.

Three members of the Eagles' scouting department, including two directors, are no longer employed by the team, NFL sources said. Director of pro personnel Rick Mueller, director of college scouting Anthony Patch and southwest area scout Brad Obee were informed that they would not return on Sunday after the draft. The purging of personnel staffs is typical when a new regime has taken over during the offseason. Teams generally wait until after the draft for fear that scouts could divulge plans to a new employer.

IN 2015, THE Eagles really ought to be better than 28th in NFL defense, 31st against the pass. The offseason remaking of coordinator Bill Davis' unit, which began with the acquisitions of linebacker Kiko Alonso and corner Byron Maxwell, among others, continued in the three-day NFL draft that ended Saturday. After the first-round selection of USC wide receiver Nelson Agholor, all five of the Eagles' draftees were defensive players, three of them cornerbacks. At least a couple of those corners, second-rounder Eric Rowe and sixth-rounder Randall Evans, can also play safety.

Ed Marynowitz, the handpicked choice of Chip Kelly to oversee the Eagles' personnel operation, has an impressive list of former bosses who have helped form his football philosophy and prepare him for the job at hand. Marynowitz is just 31 years old and has been working in the game for only 10 years, so the way he gained that experience has almost a speed-dating quality to it. His longest stint in one job was the four years and three full seasons he spent as the director of player personnel at Alabama under legendarily demanding coach Nick Saban, whom one former assistant referred to as "the devil himself.

When Chip Kelly was given full control over the Eagles and Howie Roseman was left in his wake, Ed Marynowitz said he went to the coach and offered his support. Marynowitz was the highest-ranking member of the personnel department after Roseman was stripped of his general's manager title in January and after Roseman - in his last act as GM - spearheaded Tom Gamble's removal. "I just caught him up to speed and let him know that I was here to support him in any way and did not ask to be interviewed for [what was essentially Roseman's old]

IN THE SUMMER of 2001, Dave Dunn was a first-year head football coach at Paul II High School in Boca Raton, Fla., when he got a notice from his homeowners' association: His roof was dirty and moldy. He needed to power wash it. So at preseason practice, Dunn asked his players if anybody wanted to make some money. Ed Marynowitz, Dunn's senior projected starting quarterback, jumped at the opportunity. "I said, 'Hey, we can make that happen for you,' " Marynowitz, now the Eagles' vice president of player personnel, recalled yesterday, at the end of several rounds of interviews held in anticipation of the April 30 start of the NFL draft.

ESCAPE THE confusing dissonance that now envelops the Eagles and recognize this reality: Any evaluation of the 2015 version cannot be attempted until at least the end of training camp. The team has too many unknowns . . . and too few players. So much noise surrounds the franchise. Did Jeffrey Lurie or Chip Kelly demote Howie Roseman? Is it stable? Racist? This unharmonious symphony is the work of one man, Chip Kelly, who apparently loves blue-chip players who are better known for their injuries than for their accomplishments.

THE MYSTERY of who exactly decided it was a swell idea to draft Marcus Smith last spring remains unsolved. Chip Kelly pleaded innocent last week. Insisted he didn't have final say in the draft and thinks he was in Munich or Cancun or Phil Knight's living room when Roger Goodell announced, "With the 26th pick in the 2014 draft, the Eagles select Louisville linebacker . . . " Common sense says that then-general manager Howie Roseman never would have reached for Smith unless his head coach had given the move his blessing.